


Partners

by KakumeiNoHi



Series: The Stories of Winter and her Partner [2]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Atlas Academy, Canon Universe, F/F, RWBY - Freeform, Winter Schnee - Freeform, a tiny bit of rwby fluff, atlas academy initiation headcanon, rwby canon universe, some atlas academy headcanons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:35:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26350519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KakumeiNoHi/pseuds/KakumeiNoHi
Summary: A 2nd story about how Winter & her partner from my 1st story "A Regular Night Off" first became partners..............Winter was standing inside the airship, she couldn't bring herself to sit down, like some of her fellow students. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest and she was tapping her finger on her upper arm.She was trying not to pay too much attention to the chatter of the other students, even though or maybe exactly because it was mostly about her.After all shewasthe heiress of the Schnee Dust Company.She was also in their group of initiates, which meant there was a chance one of them could become her partner during this.Thisbeing the Atlas Academy Initiation which they were all about to take part in.Winter had worked too hard to screw up now and she was trying her best to concentrate on the task ahead which was, to begin with, a deliberate jump out of an Atlas airplane in full flight with no parachute whatsoever.They had been in the air for about 40 Minutes and they should be arriving at the spot designated for the initiation any moment now.“We have now reached our destination. All students get ready to be deployed.”
Relationships: Winter Schnee/Original Female Character(s)
Series: The Stories of Winter and her Partner [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1914799
Kudos: 15





	Partners

**Author's Note:**

> My first story "A Regular Night Off" is a little fluffy story about Winter coming home after a day work. In this story I have taken that same partner and since I very much enjoyed writing them, decided to expand on their relationship and on how they met a bit more.
> 
> I had already given Winter's partner a name, but I didn't feel the need to reveal it in the first story, I had however mentioned it in a response to a comment asking about it :)  
> Now that I have decided to give her (even) more context in this story, I decided to reveal her name and some of her backstory.
> 
> Having said that: please indulge me as I am indulging myself writing these :)

Winter was standing inside the airship, she couldn't bring herself to sit down, like some of her fellow students. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest and she was tapping her finger on her upper arm.  
She was trying not to pay too much attention to the chatter of the other students, even though or maybe exactly because it was mostly about her.  
After all she _was_ the heiress of the Schnee Dust Company.

She was also in their group of initiates, which meant there was a chance one of them could become her partner during this. _This_ being the Atlas Academy Initiation which they were all about to take part in.  
Winter had worked too hard to screw up now and she was trying her best to concentrate on the task ahead which was, to begin with, a deliberate jump out of an Atlas airplane in full flight with no parachute whatsoever.  
They had been in the air for about 40 minutes and they should be arriving at the spot designated for the initiation any moment now.

_“We have now reached our destination. All students get ready to be deployed.”_

Upon hearing the announcement one of the instructors had gotten up and walked to the side of the airship to open up it up. A sudden strong icy gust of wind swept through the inside of the ship. Winter could see some of the students shiver, some because of the cold, others surely out of fear, and some maybe because of a mixture of both.

“Off you go.“

The moment the words had left the mouth of the instructor, one of the students immediately walked past Winter and towards the open door. It was _her_.  
Winter had already noticed that other student the night before. She had been wearing an emerald colored beanie and the hood of her sweater was pulled over her head as well. Today she was wearing the same beanie, but instead of a sweater she was wearing a hooded jacket. Did she ever take those off?

The student stopped at the edge of the airship and turned around with a sudden movement. Even the instructor seemed to be baffled. Her back was now facing the outside of the airship and she now faced her fellow students.

„Well, it better not suck to be one of you guys.“

She pushed herself of the edge backwards and flashing a wide cocky grin at all of them, she suddenly disappeared.  
And while the other schoolmates simply stood there, both stunned and impressed at the sheer audacity of that person, Winter wasn't going to just stand there and take it. She was not going to fall behind.

She almost immediately started to take quick and wide steps towards the open side, basically running the few steps and before the instructor was even able to say another word, she jumped. She had pushed herself off even further than she would have actually needed to.

Her aura was protecting her from the winds and pressure of falling. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. No, she had no time for that.

She drew her swords, one on each of her sides and created a wide curve of simple glyphs. Still in the air Winter turned around enough to land on her feet at the beginning of the curve and slide down.  
It had slowed her fall and she had now managed to gain more control over it. She slid off the curve to continue the fall for a few seconds and then created another curve.  
She continued the process until she was all the way down on the ground somewhere in between the cliffs of the icy tundra that surrounded the abandoned industrial area. She took another deep breath and put her swords back on their magnetic holsters on her hips.  
She was thinking of combining the two separate swords into a single heavier saber some time soon. Now that she was going to be using them even more, carrying around a pair, one on each side of her hip seemed bothersome.  
Not only that, it also easily gave away her fighting style. Having one sword that would split into two separate ones would at least give her a slight element of surprise.  
Winter didn't have a changing weapon with three to four variants like some of her classmates. Each blade however carried a type of dust in it which she could infuse her glyphs with and she was rather satisfied with her choice of weapons.

\----------

Her grandfather, whose semblance Winter inherited, had also used a sword and although his great sword was much larger than Winter's current rapiers, she felt like she was paying her respects to him in a way. After all he was the last person before her to ever actively fight and use their family semblance.

Winter knew her mother had some basic self defense training, but she also knew that even a semblance as strong as their family's could wither away and weaken, much like an unused muscle. Her mother never really turned to serious combat training or had the need to defend herself against for example something as dangerous as Grimm.  
As such the only real opportunity Winter ever had to learn a significant amount about the Schnee semblance was while talking to her grandfather Nicholas.  
His health however was fading due to all of the years he spent in the dust mines throughout his youth and he wasn't really capable of training her properly. Winter still enjoyed talking to him whenever his health would allow it and their conversations had only fueled her desire to distance herself from what the Schnee family name had become after his retirement and establish her own meaning around it and herself.

She didn't know how aware her grandfather was about what had happened to the company since he was forced to retire and his son-in-law had taken over. Winter also didn't know how knowing would effect his health further and so she kept mostly quiet about those affairs, she had also warned her younger siblings about accidentally mentioning anything.

Using her grandfather's instructions and mostly descriptions Winter had started her training by creating glyphs in her room at night or the evenings and showing them to him whenever she saw him until she was old enough to apply to Atlas Academy.

\----------

The rules of the initiation were simple. The first person you make eye contact with will be your partner for the initiation and most likely remain with you for the next four years. Together they had to find and recover the contents of at least one of the military caches stashed around the area.  
The caches were numbered, classified and ranked depending on placement and how volatile their content was to transport and keep safe. Each cache also contained the coordinates to a meeting spot they had to reach by the end of the time limit. How many and which caches they secured was completely left up to the students themselves. There would be no help, guidance or saving them if they were to get into trouble.

The area itself was filled with military security robots that were meant to attack them as well as Grimm, that were beyond the academies control.

And speaking of such Grimm, Winter had barely been walking for a few minutes towards the area, when she heard a growl behind her. She took a deep breath and turned around. A Manticore. A huge one at that.  
Winter reached for her swords. She could take it. It couldn't be any harder than the packs of Beowolves Jacques had sent at her as a test to be allowed to apply to combat training at the academy.

\----------  
\----------

Cassie Grey was a particular kind of person. She had just goaded her fellow students and jumped of the airship first almost the moment it opened up.

She had done so partially because she thought it would simply be fun, partially because she wanted to see which one of them would get riled up the most and jump next, partially because she wanted to see how well her fellow students did landing and partially because, confined in such a tight space, she was also getting slightly sensory overloaded by all those different auras and noises.

Sensing aura was considered to be a highly difficult technique in general, the women on her mother's side of the family however had always been especially gifted and sensitive when it came to that. Cassie had inherited that sensitivity as well, just as she had inherited her Faunus father's wolf ears, which she was currently hiding underneath an emerald colored beanie and the hood of her black jacket.  
Her aura sensitivity, which was naturally higher than even that of most trained licensed huntsmen and huntresses, combined with a slightly better hearing than a human's meant that underneath all of her bravado and cockiness, she was actually rather easily overwhelmed by crowds.  
Very much to the point of experiencing more or less severe anxiety attacks when she spent too much time cooped up in places filled with other people. Anxiety which had been incredibly difficult to overcome as a small child, especially after the loss of her parents and which could still be hard on her even nowadays.

She had landed on top of one of the cliffs and was now looking up to the sky to watch her fellow students jump out of the airplane. For her it was an easy thing to do. Her semblance allowed her to completely fade her whole body or just parts of it away and re-materialize them in a place of her choice.  
That is any place she could see with her eyes or far away places that she visually remembered well enough or could sense a familiar aura in that she could latch on to. Doing the later however would drain her a immensely and unlike teleportation the distance of her “Fading” was still mostly limited.  
She hadn't been in Atlas for too long, but she reckoned that she could fade about Mantle, Atlas Academy and at least from one to the other.  
Maybe doing so on a regular bases would also train her stamina when using her semblance more. Back where she was living before she came to Atlas Academy, there weren't much places close enough for her to just use her semblance to get to, the town itself was also fairly small.

She knew that if she had wanted to she also could have just immediately went from the airship to the ground, instead of re-materializing halfway through and fading again, but for once she had decided pace herself since she had no real idea as to what to expect from this initiation.

Cassie knew however that she was going to have to partner up with whoever she was going to make eye contact with first. She wasn't however going to let that be up to pure chance.  
Her future partner had to be somebody who would get riled up about a challenge, somebody who was serious about becoming a Huntsman or Huntress, somebody who knew how to handle themselves when faced with sudden difficult tasks and she also wanted somebody whose aura felt nice and easy to be around. The last thing she wanted was to end up with one of those snobby spoiled Atlesian brats who only joined the academy because they thought of it as some kind of sport.

She had seen them the night before, parading around, complaining about how they had to stay in the great hall for one night and about how much of a joke the initiation was because their fathers were going to pay the academy for their licenses even if they weren't going to do anything during the next four years.  
Which granted might have worked on the old headmaster, but Cassie was sure that General James Ironwood, who had only recently taken over the position along with being the head of the Atlas Military Force wasn't the type to succumb to bribery.  
Actually she would have been very surprised if “Jimmy” as she decided to called him, was even able to properly get along with the stuffy high society part of Atlas.  
She had arrived in Atlas a few days earlier than she had to so she could have a look around. As such she happened to catch one of those military technology displays and although Ironwood had looked like a bit of a stuck-up, as all military types did to her, the grandiosity of the display about the simplest thing presented was so over the top that she couldn't help but think about how he must have a special extravagant streak to him.

The Faunus was just about wondering about whether or not somebody would have the guts to actually follow up this quickly after her jump when she saw a second person take a long jump out of the airship. “Ooooh, nice.”  
With her white hair and mostly white and light blue clothing Cassie could barely see her on the similar colored sky.  
She had noticed the other girl on the airship before, she had a soothingly cool aura around her, concentrating on it for a bit had actually helped Cassie calm down for as long as she had been on the airship. Her eyes were a nice shade of blue and the looks she gave with them were rather icy, she was quiet the whole time and her whole expression really was rather surly. People seemed to be avoiding and talking about her for some reason, but Cassie was too busy trying to keep herself together and not drown in the noise to pay attention to what they were actually saying.

Who would have thought she would be the one to go second only moments after Cassie had jumped herself? Not only that, it almost looked like she had made it a point to make a longer jump than the one Cassie had done before she had faded down. Cassie smiled to herself. “Well, _she_ certainly didn't come to play.”

She saw the girl conjuring some type of glyphs and elegantly sliding down on top of them. That looked difficult to control. Cassie was intrigued as she watched her land in between two cliffs sides of the white tundra.

She doubted that whoever came next would be as interesting as this. Still on top of the cliff side she started to run and fade towards the one who had immediately piqued her entire interest.

\----------  
\----------

Winter watched the Manticore she had just taken down disintegrate in the air. It had taken her a bit longer than she would have liked but she had finished it.

She wasn't however going to stop and take a break here. Sword still in hand, she stretched out her right arm and summoned another glyph. She closed her eyes to concentrate, she reminded herself of the Manticore, its movements and the way it fought her. Winter took a deep breath. As she was breathing out she felt her aura seeping out of her and she opened her eyes to watch the Manticore rise up once again. This time however it was white with a blueish tint and her new trusted ally.

“Now, that's really neat.”

Both Winter and the Manticore immediately looked up to the direction of the voice they suddenly heard, but nobody was there.

Winter was surprised as she suddenly felt another person's back leaning onto hers, she almost immediately tried to turn around only for that person to move along and turn with her.

“Relax. I'm just another student.”

Winter decided to stand still for now. Now that she wasn't surprised by it, she also actually recognized the voice.

“You're the one who jumped first.”

A chuckle. “Yeah, I am. And you jumped second. Let's just stay standing like this for a bit, alright?”

“You were watching us?”

“Obviously. As potential partners, I wanted to sort out those with no landing strategy.”

“Oh, really? So you came here and partnered up with me simply because you saw me landing?”

Winter was annoyed. She knew that there was always a risk involved with getting paired up randomly, but this wasn't at least a choice made by chance. Once again somebody else had made a decision regarding her life for her and without her input. Was she really going to have to rely on somebody as whimsical as that?  
To begin with she was probably most likely just making up that kind of stupid excuse and she simply wanted a be partnered up with the Schnee heiress. Winter had heard her fellow students talk about her on the airship. Most of them talking about how good it would look if they became her partner, calling her “The Ice Queen”.

The other girl hummed ever so slightly. “Well, technically we're not yet partners, are we?”

Winter was stunned. “What are you talking about? The rules clearly said: the first person you make eye conta-” Winter stopped mid-sentence. It suddenly dawned on her.

“Is this why you want us to stay like this? Back to back?”

“Yeah, what did you think I am? Somebody who would just push herself onto somebody else on a whim without considering the other person's feelings?”

Winter stayed silent. She didn't know how to deal with that kind of sincerity calling her out like that. Yes. That had been exactly what she was thinking among other things.

“How cruel of you, that really hurts _my_ feelings, you know?”

Winter heard a quiet giggle coming from her back and she was glad she wasn't facing the other girl, since she felt her cheeks blush slightly.

She looked at the white Manticore that was standing next to them and decided that she didn't need it for now. To begin with she only had summoned it to not forget and because it was easier to try and first do so immediately after defeating a Grimm. She watched it disintegrate for a second time.

“What's that about by the way? Your glyphs looked really nice and complicated in the air, I thought they were some kind platforms you can control. But you can do more with them then?”

Winter couldn't blame her for not knowing more about her Schnee Semblance, not many people even in Atlas these days remembered more than the glyphs and Winter didn't even know if her potential partner even was from Atlas.

“Both different types of glyphs and summoning your fallen enemies are part of the Semblance every Schnee inherits.” Winter explained.

“Schnee?” Winter narrowed her eyes upon hearing the girl repeat her name.

“Schnee...wait, as in 'Dust Company'? _Schnee Dust Company_? You're one of them?”

“Yes....” Winter had answered slowly, did she really not know who she was? Even if she had been living in some kind of backwater town on another continent she must have at least heard the other students talking about her.

“Winter Schnee, actually heiress to the Schnee Dust Company.“

“Really?”

Winter truly couldn't hear any pretense. Could it be that she really wasn't lying and she didn't just choose her because she was a Schnee?

“Yes.....how did you not know? Did you not hear everybody talking?”

“Well, I don't know, I can't listen to all of that noise and talking....I just walked up to you 'cause your semblance looked pretty and interesting and your aura felt nice...”

Winter once again didn't know how to react to that kind of sincerity. Suddenly she was extremely conscious about their backs touching and she started to notice the warmth it brought.

“Just who are you anyway?” she managed to blurt out.

“Oh, right, sorry. I never even told you my name. I'm Cassie Grey and uhm, since we've gotten this far already I should also probably tell you I'm a Faunus.”

“A Faunus?”

“Yeah, the big ears to hear you better kinda Faunus, you know?”

“Ohh, so that's what the beanie and the hood are about. You're hiding your ears?”

“Well, I wasn't going to keep hiding them, but I didn't want to be bothered and have people avoiding me before I even had the chance to get to the initiation...”

“I see...so now that you have found a partner you're going to take them off?”

“I was going to...wait, you're really going to be my partner then? You don't mind me being a Faunus? Humans aren't usually fond of us.”

“Do you mind me being a Schnee? Faunus usually don't seem to be fond of us. Not that I blame you.”

Cassie laughed. “Fair enough. So do we turn around now, so I get to look into those pretty blues?”

Winter rolled those exact pretty blues at who was about to become her partner, even if said partner couldn't see her doing it.  
She was used to stupid pickup lines. This time however unlike the usual ulterior and self-serving motives she knew people had when hitting on the heiress, Winter could hear clear playful amusement in the other person's voice. But just what was she about to get herself into? Still that refreshing cheekiness somehow made her smile a little as she decided to give her answer.

“Yes.”

The warmth Winter had started to feel on her back suddenly disappeared and she turned around to look into pair of emerald green eyes framed by a large grin and a pair of wolf ears.

“Yaaaaay.”

“So where to now? Did you see anything on your way here? You were up top, right?”

“Hmmm, yeah, there was something that looked like an abandoned dust mine shaft somewhere around there.” Cassie pointed to a direction somewhere north of where they currently were, still outside of the industrial area.

”I didn't get close though. Wanna check it out?”

“A mine shaft? Sound like we could score a lot of points there, let's go.” Winter started to walk towards the mentioned direction.

“Oh, can we ride on that Manticore thing you can make?”

“No. And don't call it a Manticore _thing_.”

“What?! Why not? You're no fun.”

“Well, too bad we already locked on to each other then.”

Winter could hear Cassie chuckle as she caught up to walk beside her.

“ _You_ still haven't told me about _your_ semblance by the way. You keep disappearing, is it teleportation? And come to think of it, what was that me having a 'nice aura' about?”

“Well, my dear Winter, come here and let me tell you the tales of my greatness.”

Cassie's cheek was suddenly very close to Winter's and her arm almost around her shoulder. Winter immediately put her hand in between their faces and shoved her new partner off.

“I can hear you fine from over there.”

“Ah, how very aloof of you. But just so you know: there's no need to hold back on me. I'm convinced you'll warm up to me eventually.”

“Good luck, they don't call me 'Ice Queen' for nothing.”

“Oh? What was that? A joke, Miss Schnee? Are you already having fun with little old me?”

“Oh, just be quiet and walk.” Winter said, as she yet couldn't help but to smile a little.  
Could it be that she really was enjoying this kind of stupid pointless banter? She almost felt a little guilty for maybe having a little more fun than she should during the initiation.

“Awww.” Winter stepped to the side to dodge Cassie's attempt to put her hand on top of her head to pat her.

“Don't touch me.” Winter had also grabbed Cassie by the wrist and dropped their arms.

Cassie looked at her wrist which was currently still loosely held by Winter and hummed in amusement.

“Alright, I'll try my best. No promises though, but I'm sure you'll tell me if I go too far.”

Winter left out a sigh. “Wonderful.”

On the open she may have been sarcastic about it.

But in her heart of hearts, Winter who so badly wanted to break free from her family name had a feeling that this new partner of hers might just have enough boldness for the both of them.

“Come on, I'll show you where I saw the mine.”

They started walking again.

**Author's Note:**

> Trivia Time :)
> 
> I called Winter's partner Cassie/Cassandra Grey (as in "gray wolf"). She normally goes by "Cassie" though, because she doesn't like being called by her full name (for reasons...)  
> Winter usually just calls her "Cass" and she's the only one who does that :) (unless she's actually mad or dead serious, then it's full name time, whether she likes it or not) 
> 
> I go by the notion of Winter representing "The Huntsman" in the story of Weiss' Snow White.  
> While both Winter and Weiss are Huntresses in the sense of the profession, at least to me Weiss is only Snow White, but a Snow White who took down the evil queen/Jacques herself, rather than have the Huntsman do it for her :)
> 
> I wanted Winter to expand on those analogies on her own side and her partner to "be a wolf", although not as an antagonist, but rather as a counterpart :) 
> 
> Cassie is also supposed to be a contrast to Ruby's Little Red Riding Hood, Ruby being Weiss' partner, to show how both sisters are very similar, but still essentially different :)


End file.
